Ethics in the digital workplace
Digitisation and automation technologies, including artificial intelligence (AI), can affect working conditions in a variety of ways and their use in the workplace raises a host of new ethical concerns.
The German based windmill manufacturer in Denmark, Siemens Wind Power, has decided to cease production of wind turbine blades at a factory in the small town of Engesvang in Mid-Jutland in the coming months. In connection with the closure all of the 430 employees at the site will be dismissed. According to the management, the main reason for the closure is that the factory in Engesvang does not have the capacity to produce the 75 metre long wind turbine blades. This is contradicted by a city council representative, who points out that there is a large field beside the factory that could be used to expand production capacity.
The production of wind turbine blades at Engesvang will be done at the factory in Aalborg in the future, which comes as a surprise for the local union 3F, since the dismissal of 148 employees in Aalborg was announced in January 2017. During the next three weeks the management and the representative of the union and the employees (which is the same person) at the factory will negotiate the details concerning the redundancies.
Eurofound (2017), Siemens Wind Power, Closure in Denmark, factsheet number 90306, European Restructuring Monitor. Dublin, https://restructuringeventsprod.azurewebsites.net/restructuring-events/detail/90306.